Insights from my Back Porch
Paul J. Murphy
In between rain showers I embarked on a home maintenance project - restraining my front and rear porch
decks. Admittedly this was overdue. It had been 4-5 years since our decks had been stained. The cedar boards
were dry and weathered, thirsty for a fresh cost of sealing stain to renew them.
This seemingly straightforward project became a time consuming, complex exercise that has given me fresh
spiritual insight into myself, and perhaps into each one of us.
After cleaning the surface of my decks, I was off to the paint store to select a stain. I knew I did not want a
bright color stain that would make my deck look like it had been to a tanning booth. I was advised to use oilbased stain. After examining the color choices I settled on "prairie gray". Starting with my rear deck, I carefully
followed the directions (applying 2 coats spaced 30 minutes apart). To my shock and displeasure "prairie gray"
turned out to be a fleshy almost dull peach color once applied to my dry cedar boards. How could we look at
THAT color every day? So it was back to the paint store to find out how to remove the fleshy peach stain and
replace it with a washed out gray that I thought "prairie gray" would produce on my decks. But, a funny thing
happened at the paint store. As I spoke about my problem to the paint specialist his face contorted in a twisted
look of pain and distress. His advice - I would first need to remove the 2 coats of stain by using a stain stripper,
and follow that with a deck "brightener" to restore the wood color to my cedar boards while washing away the
residue from the peach colored stain. Armed with 2 separate (not inexpensive) gallons of stripper and
brightener I returned home. My lesson was just beginning!
The stripper had little effect. I returned to the paint store. The paint specialist suggested I try a second coating
of stripper (another gallon of stripper was purchased). The second coating of stripper helped a bit. But, the
peachy stain clearly had settled into my thirsty cedar boards and had no intentions of leaving. It was not "on" the
cedar boards. It was "in", part of, embedded into the boards.
So with stripper still floating on top of the freshly stained boards I tried sheer force - power hosing the deck.
Intense concentrated high pressure streams of water slowly (and I do mean... slooooooowly) inch by stubborn
inch began to dig the stain up, blasting it from the cedar boards. I actually was feeling sorry for the cedar
boards, as if I was subjecting them to abuse in my quest to separate and remove the peachy stain from them.
The results were imperfect at best. In places I had my old cedar boards back. In other sections, the boards still
held long thin streaks of peachy stain that I could not remove.
After the "brightener" was applied I had a 48 hour wait, to allow the boards to dry. And then it was time to try
"take 2" on staining my decks.
My decks are now a light gray stain. Our neighbor Harry came over to see my newly stained decks. He glanced,
stared for a moment, said "huh" and then turned and headed for home. The light gray is not exactly what I had
hoped for but there is NO WAY that I am going to attempt to strip and brighten those decks again. We are
learning to live with the light gray. As my wife says "it is good enough".
JEREMIAH 17:9 "the heart is deceitful above all things, and beyond cure. Who can understand it?"
Our hearts are 'stained' by sin, and that residue is deeply hidden, embedded, merged into the inner fabric of our
motives, our needs, how we do life and relationships. The word "deceitful" in Hebrew means a 'swelling up'...it
was used for 'a hill'. In a word - pride. We often do not recognize how much we are self-seeking, self-serving,
wanting and needing to be elevated (either literally by status of position and outward trappings of success, or by
being lifted up by the praise of others). Perhaps you disagree. Like me, you may say "I am not seeking to be
elevated". Then why is it you and I so easily get offended, or get our feelings hurt? Is some of it because we are
overly sensitive to needing to be thought well of (elevated) by others?
Jeremiah's severe prognosis of the human heart has further bad news. He says it is "beyond cure. Who can
understand it?"
Put these two truths from Jeremiah together - we are prone to self-deception by our inner need to be elevated
and thought well of, and this stain is so embedded that it is incurable. We are all infected with a life-threatening
illness of self-deception...and we do not see or recognize the self- seeking, self-serving manifestations of our
disease.
Consider the surgeon-like perspective in Jesus's words to us.
"First take the beam from your own eye, then you will be able to remove the speck from your
brother's eye" (Matthew 7:3-5)
"He cuts off every branch of mine that does not produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do
bear fruit so they will produce even more". (John 15:2)
And Paul has the same perspective - that the Lord is extracting the stain of sinful self-centeredness out of us.
Trials now take on a different value. Rather than skiing "why me Lord?", we can instead ask "what is it You want
to do and prune and grow in me through this Lord?"
"He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness" (Hebrews 12:10)
"We all reflecting as in a mirror the glory of The Lord, are being transformed into His image" (2
Corinthians 3:18)
As Walter Wangerin noted, "this growing up is such hard work." And it continues throughout this life and into the
next. "This corruptible must put on in corruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." (1 Corinthians
15:53-54). Heaven is not merely about being with The Lord unendingly. Heaven is also when we experience the
completed transformation, the entire removal of the stain of self-centeredness that infects us and distorts our
motives and taints our relationships here on earth.
This is not to make us feel heavy or disheartened. Rather it is a loving reminder from the Lord. He aims to do a
deep, lasting transformation of our lives, weaning us from self-seeking and self-serving. More than simply coming
to a faith in Christ, His desire and will for us is for us to grow up, to become new, to, live as people who are
being transformed, pruned and bearing "more fruit".
Now trials have a redemptive, surgical purpose. Now mature Christians, like a physical therapist serve as role
models who show us how living this new life in Christ actually looks and acts in our attitudes and in our
relationships.
Humility...patience (with myself and equally with the immaturity of others)...and cooperation with the inner
growing up transforming work of the Spirit - these can be the heart attitudes that make our journey through this
life a renewing, deepening experience.
Under divine construction with you,
Paul